A bill seeks to guarantee the right to inclusive language in Argentina

It was presented by Deputy Mónica Macha and responds to a bill that seeks to prohibit inclusive language in the State.

August 13, 2021

Agustina Ramos

Ariel Gutraich

A bill seeking to guarantee the right to use gender-inclusive language was introduced today in the Argentine Chamber of Deputies. The initiative " aims to ensure that all individuals and legal entities can make use of this fundamental tool for human beings," Mónica Macha, the Frente de Todos deputy who sponsored the bill, told Presentes.

Its purpose is “to guarantee the exercise of the right to freedom of expression in the use of the plurality of linguistic uses encompassed by gender-inclusive language, in all areas in which people develop their social life,” states the text of the bill entitled “Exercise of the right to use gender-inclusive language.”.

Congresswoman Mónica Macha told Presentes that she had been “talking about inclusive language with some colleagues for some time now,” and an event prompted them to accelerate their discussion. “A couple of weeks ago, a bill was introduced prohibiting the use of inclusive language,” Macha said, referring to the bill presented in the Chamber of Deputies by lawyers Cynthia Ginni and Patricia Paternesi that prohibits its use in all three branches of government, in education, and at official events.

“The purpose of this project we are presenting is to guarantee the right to use inclusive language. We are not requiring all institutions to do so; it is not a regulation that seeks to establish inclusive language in all spaces, nor is it prohibitive, but rather it establishes the right to use it,” Macha explained.

It is not mandatory nor does it seek to punish.

Another key aspect of the project is that it is not mandatory and, fundamentally, it prevents a person from being sanctioned, so no one could be punished for speaking or writing in inclusive language.

The project guarantees the right to use inclusive language "in presentations, speeches, addresses, resolutions, decrees, laws, rulings, court filings and all other forms of expression that are officially used in the national State."

Also, in “establishments of the National Education System, at all levels and modalities, whether public or private” and it is clarified that “this rule includes both oral and written language”.

Furthermore, it invites the Provinces, the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires, the National Universities and the Federal Council of Education to join.

The bill was drafted by Mara Glozman, a CONICET researcher based at the Institute of Linguistics of the University of Buenos Aires; Guadalupe Maradei, a professor and researcher at the University of Buenos Aires specializing in literary theory and criticism with a gender perspective; and SaSa Testa, a master in Gender Studies and Policies and a non-binary trans activist.

In addition, it has the support of national deputies Gabriela Estevez, Jimena Lopez, Patricia Mounier, Ayelén Spósito, Alicia Aparicio, Verónica Caliva, Carolina Yutrovic, Mara Brawer and Estela Hernández.

“It is an initiative that, by raising the possibility of using gender-inclusive language, would primarily achieve the inclusion of non-binary people in this language, so we undoubtedly start from the premise that it is a good initiative,” Sole Caballero, a non-binary lesbian activist and representative of 100% Diversity and Rights in Neuquén, told Presentes.

In this sense, she continued: “Non-binary people are forced to read all the study material that comes from an educational institution in a predominantly masculine binary language and also to celebrate laws and decrees that, on the one hand, institutionally validate our rights but, on the other hand, due to technicalities in those institutions' writings, continue to violate us by mentioning only men and women.”

Accompany other rights

In this way, the bill would guarantee the right to dignified treatment and to be named according to the self-perceived gender identity, as provided for in the Gender Identity Law (No. 26,743) in its article 12 and 1, subsection “c”.

To justify the bill, the team that drafted it relied on positions from international organizations and national legislation on gender perspective, positions from academic institutions and national bodies regarding gender-inclusive language, and reasons supported by linguistic studies.

"The project is very solidly grounded. Not only in international aspects regarding human rights, in this sense the human right to freedom of expression, but it also presents a fairly extensive list of precedents at the national level where various universities and public institutions, such as ANSES, issued resolutions favorable to the use of inclusive language," said SaSa Testa, a non-binary trans activist who participated in the drafting of the project, to Presentes.

Regarding the reasons based on linguistic studies, Deputy Macha stated: “We felt it was important to be able to raise it from the discipline of linguistics itself, and in reality there is no situation that puts tension on, or suggests that, this use of inclusive language is unnecessary or prohibitive.”

“I find it interesting that this discussion can take place within the discipline of linguistics because sometimes referring to an institution like the Royal Spanish Academy (RAE) seems to stifle or silence all debate. When we are talking about these social and political constructs, there is no language that can be considered static and definitive; rather, language must allow us to express the ideas and needs of a given era,” she concluded.

For SaSa Testa, this project takes place “in a historical and social context where there is already a community of speakers who are using it and advocating for it, and with a government that, in its public policies, is demonstrating that it is a government that expands rights for citizens.”

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